Notwithstanding Warren Buffet’s claim that his assistant pays income tax at a higher rate than he, the fact is that the bottom 50% of earners pay at a rate of 2.98%, the top 5% at 20.78% and the top 1% at 23.13%.
Barack Hussein Obama wants to tax the rich more, more, and more! He has plans for your money. Things to do; stuff to buy; worlds to save. TaxProf Blog observes that, as things stand today, the rich are the only ones paying taxes. The bottom 50% of earners pay only 3% of all taxes.
Top 1% Pay More Income Tax Than Bottom 90%
The Tax Foundation has published Summary of Latest Federal Individual Income Tax Data:
New data released by the IRS today offers interesting insights into the distributional spread of the federal income tax burden, new analysis by the Tax Foundation shows. The new data shows that the top-earning 25% of taxpayers (AGI over $62,068) earned 67.5% of the nation’s income, but they paid more than four out of every five dollars collected by the federal income tax (86%). The top 1% of taxpayers (AGI over $364,657) earned approximately 21.2% of the nation’s income (as defined by AGI), yet paid 39.4% of all federal income taxes. That means the top 1% of tax returns paid about the same amount of federal individual income taxes as the bottom 95% of tax returns.
| Table 1. Summary of Federal Individual Income Tax Data, 2005 (Updated October 2007) | |||||||
| Number of | Taxes | Group’s | Group’s | Income | Average | ||
| Returns with | AGI | Paid | Share of | Share of | Split | Tax | |
| Positive AGI | ($millions) | ($millions) | Total AGI | Taxes | Point | Rate | |
| All Taxpayers | 132,611,637 | $7,507,958 | $934,703 | 100.00% | 100.00% | - | 12.45% |
| Top 1% | 1,326,116 | $1,591,711 | $368,132 | 21.20% | 39.38% | > $364,657 | 23.13% |
| Top 2-5% | 5,304,466 | $1,092,223 | $189,627 | 14.55% | 20.29% | 17.36% | |
| Top 5% | 6,630,582 | $2,683,934 | $557,759 | 35.75% | 59.67% | > $145,283 | 20.78% |
| Top 6-10% | 6,630,582 | $803,076 | $99,326 | 10.70% | 10.63% | 12.37% | |
| Top 10% | 13,261,164 | $3,487,010 | $657,085 | 46.44% | 70.30% | > $103,912 | 18.84% |
| Top 11-25% | 19,891,745 | $1,582,445 | $146,687 | 21.08% | 15.69% | 9.27% | |
| Top 25% | 33,152,909 | $5,069,455 | $803,772 | 67.52% | 85.99% | > $62,068 | 15.86% |
| Top 26-50% | 33,152,909 | $1,475,369 | $102,256 | 19.65% | 10.94% | 6.93% | |
| Top 50% | 66,305,819 | $6,544,824 | $906,028 | 87.17% | 96.93% | > $30,881 | 13.84% |
| Bottom 50% | 66,305,818 | $963,134 | $28,675 | 12.83% | 3.07% | < $30,881 | 2.98% |
| Source: Internal Revenue Service | |||||||
